Sub/Version(s)

“It is always challenging to present an ongoing process of research rather than the final outcomes it produces. Especially when the research, titled Sub/Version(s), questions whether we can even perceive power without participating in its appropriation.

A subversive study of filmmaking, my research investigates the possibilities of reverse-engineering the cinematic commodity into something different, something new. Working with scripted materials and salvaged footage, CCTV material, archival hacking or drone recordings - to name a few concrete examples from previous projects - I aim at creating cinematic experiences which are emancipated from industry ideologies of market hierarchy and high budget dependency.

I explore the definition of film making - in search for innovative possibilities beyond the screen surface. Sub/Version(s)’ point of departure is to alter theoretical thinking into practical engagement. By taking themes and terms - such as ‘insurgence’ or ‘subversion’ - and examining the movement from their philosophical core to their emotional resonance, one can study and put into better practice the ways they are effecting and affecting us on individual, collective and social levels.

Still from 'Drone Drive By'

With study cases stretching over a timeline of more than two millenniums - from the rebellion against the Roman occupation in Judea, through the Second World War, to the contemporary Israeli oppression in the occupied territories - the research follows that long and dark road in order to subvert its course.

Having my origin in a society in which the personal and the political blend in all layers of life, I am transforming this condition into material and methods of work. I am searching for ways to overcome the solidified, sieged state of mind, preferably in modes of action taken from its own militant vocabulary. One of those ways is to use the pattern recognition mechanism, upon which conformity relies, in order to infiltrate into it an image of disobedience.

Still from 'Watchmen'

A ADuring the last night of their official high-school heritage tour in Poland, a group of Israeli students confront themselves, when a not so innocent prank gets out of hand as the violent nature of their present lives breaks the surface.In this cinematically condensed neo noir, currently under development as my first fiction feature, I deal directly with the basis of collective traumas upon which militant societies are founded, namely the way these regimes are often manipulating these traumas into a binary perspective, in which one is either a victim or a perpetrator.

The heritage tour Israeli high school students are subjected to, perpetuates the situation of occupation in the sieged state of mind. As violence is regimented and channelled through the mandatory military service, so does the sexuality of teenagers and young adults. In the continuous state of war of such a state of mind, the enlistment is an extremely efficient catalyst for sexual needs and desires deflected into primal power politics.